LC 

10451 

As 




Calendar No. 575. 



65th Congress, 
3d Session. 



SENATE. 



{ 



Report 
No. 630. 



VOCATIONAL EDUCATION. 



December 26, 1918. — Ordered to be printed. 



Mr. Smith of Georgia, from the^Committee on Education and Labor, 
submitted the following 

REPORT. 

[To accompany S. 4922.] 

The Committee on Education and Labor, to whom was referred the 
bill (S. 4922) providing for the promotion of vocational rehabilitation 
of persons disabled in industry or otherwise and their return to civil 
employment, having considered the same, report it favorably and 
recommend its passage with the amendments hereinafter proposed. 

No one appeared against the bill at the joint public hearing con- 
ducted for three days by the Committees on Education of Senate and 
House. Representatives of many different interests were present in 
person or by letter and gave hearty indorsement to the measure. 
These included State compensation boards, State boards for voca- 
tional education, the American Federation of Labor, the Brotherhood 
of Locomotive Engineers, the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen, 
the National Manufacturers' Association, the American Society for 
Social Legislation, the National Antituberculosis Society, the 
American Museum of Safety, the United States Employees' Compen- 
sation Commission, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the Depart- 
ment of Labor, 

In order to promote self-dependency among our people and to con- 
serve the labor power of the country, this bill provides an annual 
grant to aid the States in giving vocational education to persons so 
disabled in their employment or otherwise that they can not follow 
their old occupation successfully or take up a new one without 
special training. 

The hearings before the committee showed that each year a total 
of not less than three-quarters of a million casualties occur among 
our wageworkers in all occupations. This means that each year 
there are added to the army of the permanently disabled tens of 
thousands of new recruits. A conservative estimate seems to show 
that there are at the present time not less than 500,000 persons of 
I working age who are suffering from permanent vocational handicaps. 



VOCATIONAL EDUCATION". 

Witli.'^e exception of a few experiments by private agencies no 
pi'oyision, public or private, lias ever been made in this country for 
Retraining and placing those handicapped persons who without this 
help have been doomed to mendicancy, or dependency, or casual and 
uncertain employment or employment in low-grade positions in 
which they eke out an unhappy existence. The loss to the man and 
his dependents is great, but in the aggregate the loss to the Nation 
in man power, in undeveloped skills and talents, and in the support 
of dependency is enormous. 

The experience of our allies in giving vocational rehabilitation to 
disabled soldiers and sailors during the past four years shows that 
handicapped men are eager to take training, that employers are glad 
to employ such men after they have been properly prepared for their 
work, and that with very few exceptions every disabled man with 
proper guidance and training can be placed in a desirable position 
where he can compete with normal men. Indeed, it is a very com- 
mon thing for the disabled soldier or sailor after training to be placed 
in a better position than the one he held before the war. Wliile the 
program of vocational rehabilitation for our own disabled soldiers 
and sailors has just begun, the experience of the Federal Board for 
Vocational Education justifies the expectation that the results in 
this country will be at least equally good. This evidence shows that 
if an efficient plan for the vocational rehabilitation of the disabled 
wageworker were developed by the States with the encouragement 
of the National Government, practically everyone of the great army 
of handicapped men in our midst could be made a national asset 
instead of a national liability; and the expenditure annually of a 
small amount of money among the States by the National Govern- 
ment would be a wise investment yielding annually large and rich 
dividends in increased earning power for the individual, with all this 
means in comfort and happiness for himself and his dependents and 
increased economic and social efficiency and well-being for the 
Nation. 

The shortage of labor in all the belligerent countries of Europe, 
which was an inevitable consequence of the most destructive war in 
history, is certain to produce a corresponding shortage of labor in 
this country by reversing so far as our foreign population is con- 
cerned the current of migration. At least it is certain that for many 
years to come there will be no migration to this country at all com- 
parable to that which was taking place before the war. This means 
an inevitable labor shortage which will require the immediate and 
continuous development and conservation of our own human 
resources to meet and overcome. 

An analysis of industrial occupations just made by the Federal 
Board for Vocational Education covering a very wide field of eco- 
nomic activities makes it very clear that there is some place in 
industry for every disabled man, even the blind or the legless man, 
in which he can with proper guidance and training compete on equal 
terms with normal men. In our highly specialized modern indus- 
trial life, with its minute division of employments and tasks, it is 
possible, therefore,- for practically every handicapped man under an 
intelligent program of vocational rehabilitation to discharge accept- 
ably some task as a fuU substitute for a normal man. In each 

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■ Ov^ VOCATIONAL EDUCATION. 3 

v^ individual case the problem is simply one of selecting the right 
fK employment and of training for it. 

A Nation-wide program among all the States for the vocational 
retraining and placement of disabled persons which wiU restore them 
to efficient service in our productive and commercial life is one 
obvious and feasible means for meeting our shortage of labor. Fur- 
thermore, to continue to neglect the development and utilization of 
the great human resources of the army of handicapped people 
increasing in size every year with the growth of our population is a 
national foUy more inexcusable, if anything, than any failure to 
develop our forests, to harness our waterpower, or to preserve the 
fertility of our soil. 

Practically all of the arguments which have been presented in 
support of the program of vocational reeducation of disabled soldiers 
and sailors may be urged with equal force in support of the present 
measure. These were fully developed in the hearings and in the 
discussion before Congress when the vocational rehabilitation act was 
enacted, and need not be given here. The vocational rehabilitation 
act, however, provided that the entire cost of instruction for disa- 
bled soldiers and sailors, including support while in training, should 
be borne by the National Govertiment. By the present bill the 
States would bear the entire cost of giving vocational instruction to 
disabled civilian workers but would receive annually from the Na- 
tional Government a small allotment of money to be used as partial 
reimbursement for work done by the State according to plans approved 
by the Federal Board for Vocational Education. That this assist- 
ance by the National Government would encourage the States to 
develop the work rapidly is shown by the rapid growth of the land- 
grant colleges where the expenditures by the States have been 20 
times as great as the amounts received under numerous Federal acts 
for various purposes. 

Clearly, if it was wise as a business investment and as a policy 
of national conservation of human resources to provide for the in- 
struction and full support of disabled soldiers and sailors at the expense 
of the National Government, it is equally wise and equitable that the 
National Government shall provide annually a smaller sum of money 
to enable the States to inaugurate and maintain a plan of vocational 
instruction for that much larger army of persons who become disa- 
bled through no fault of their own in the performamce of duties 
necessary to the comfort and the prosperity of the country. 

The bill seems to be the third and necessary final step in a program 
of nation wide vocational education which was initiated by the 
vocational education act (February, 1917). This assists the States 
in providing vocational education for the normal boys and girls 
and men and women employed in wage-earning occupations. The 
same benefit was extended by providing special instruction for those 
who had been handicapped in the war for our liberties. But this 
group of handicapped persons, worthy as they are and sacred as is 
the task of helping them, is small indeed compared to the great army 
of handicapped civilian workers. It remains to provide through this 
present bill a scheme whereby the States, in conjunction with the 
National Government, may offer to every disabled wageworker 
the chance to get the help with which he may find his place in society 
and carry on successfully as a self-dependent worker and citizen. 



VOCATIONAL EDUCATIOl^. 



There is nothing new in the proposition to extend the benefits of 
vocational education through special training to handicapped wage 
workers. The principle of national grants for these purposes for 
vocational education has been established through a long series of 
acts culminating in the vocational education act of 1917. The 
principle of special training for handicapped persons was established 
by the Vocational Rehabilitation Act of 1918. Precedent as well 
as justice speak in favor of this present bill. 

The time seems ripe for the enactment of this bill now. Public 
sentiment from every quarter has as the result of the war become 
focused on the need for the conservation of our human resources, 
and the worth of the handicapped man made fit for his work by 
special advisement training and placement. The administrative 
machinery necessary for carrying out a cooperative program between 
the State and National Governments for the vocational rehabilitation 
of the disabled wage worker has already been established by previous 
State and Federal laws. Federal and State boards for vocational 
education are already engaged in the same more general task for the 
normal worker. 

By the vocational rehabilitation act, the Federal Board for Voca- 
tional Education was charged with the duty of providing for voca- 
tional advisement, training, and placement for those disabled in the 
war. The present bill adds to the board the further duty of adminis- 
tering a national grant to the States for the disabled workers, to 
be administered by the State boards for vocational education. As 
the result of its work with the disabled soldier and sailor the Federal 
board has already gained and is constantly gaining information and 
experience with regard to the handicapped man and is building up 
a corps of experts with special experience in the many and difficult 
•problems connected with the vocational restoration of the disabled 
man. All of this will be a priceless asset for the work of training 
and placing those disabled while in the performance of their daily 
tasks. If used now all this will be made a permanent contribution 
to the solution of a problem which the National Government must 
inevitably aid the States in solving. Otherwise the loss in money^ 
delay, and intelligent solution of the matter will be great. 

The committee agreed that these amendments be made to the bill 
(S. 4922) before reporting the same: In line 4 of page 1 strike out 
the word 'industry" and substitute in place thereof the word 
^'occupations. " In line 7 of page 8 insert after the word '^ accepted "■ 
the words ''together with the names of the donors and the respective 
amounts contributed by each." 

With these changes the committee reports the bill favorably and 
recommends its passage. 

o 



Makers 
Syracuse. N. Y 

PAT. IAN. 21, 1908 





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